MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — Starting Thursday usage of electronic smoking devices and vaping products will be a violation at WVU Morgantown, Keyser and Beckley campuses.
The measure that was adopted by the WVU Board of Governors in February is simply adding those devices to the already in-place WVU tobacco policy.
Rocco Fucillo, WVU state and local relations specialist made a recent appearance on MetroNews ‘Talkline’ and said the policy is specific.
“It’s everything you describe,” he said of the ban. “Any part of the university boundary, anything within university property.”
Fucillo said the university is taking a 3-prong philosophy when it comes to enforcement of the ban, with one being a communications campaign for university relations.
“We have been doing outreach, newsletters, meeting people in person. It’s constant awareness, something that we learned from our 2013 implementation of the original policy that wasn’t done that we are going to do now,” he said.
An educational component, partnering with Well WVU, is a second approach. The university will create a student ambassador program to provide education and outreach for no tobacco, e-cigs, and cessation program.
Fucillo said WVU is also trying to create a culture of voluntary compliance. There is a website set up to anonymously report any violations of smoking or vaping.
The Morgantown campus will have a compliance officer that will provide a warning for the first violation.
Fucillo said on ‘Talkline’ that the only exception for vaping will be at large athletic events. The university has designated smoking areas at football games where vaping will be allowed.
He said the bottom line with the vaping ban is “not a punitive culture kind of thing” but is about health and wellness.
“It’s part of our goal for WVU and the whole state to promote wellness and health for everyone,” Fucillo said. “That’s what we want to do. We want to do that knowing because the state of West Virginia leads in tobacco use and cancer deaths by tobacco use and cardiovascular disease and we see so many young people, their numbers are staggering.”
The ban includes WVU Institute of Technology and Potomac State College.
Rocco Fucillo, WVU State and Local Relations Specialist, talks with @HoppyKercheval about the change to the WVU campus tobacco policy starting Thursday, August 1st, prohibiting vaping on campus. WATCH: https://t.co/wkudfIAoe1 pic.twitter.com/qLBVCg0z8P
— MetroNews (@WVMetroNews) July 30, 2019